


Adventures in Xenobiology, or What Not to Put in Your Mouth

by thisthorn



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-02
Updated: 2012-05-02
Packaged: 2017-11-05 02:45:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/401589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisthorn/pseuds/thisthorn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Obviously Spock didn’t understand the reference, because no human would deny that this was <em>awesome.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Adventures in Xenobiology, or What Not to Put in Your Mouth

**Author's Note:**

> Art included at the end because slow work days and an overabundance of Sharpies make for tragedy.

"Tell me Mr. Scott, if we get close enough to beam down to the planet's surface, will this old heap be able to escape the planet's gravity again after we realize the distress signal is fake and that the natives just want to mug us and possibly use our skulls as paperweights?"

 

Jim thought he was being quite funny, but apparently Scotty got hung up on the "old heap" bit, because he was already mid-rant by the time Jim finished.

 

"...not to mention, Captain, that she's got a whole basket of piebald haggis more than most Federation unsensible arrays, and that's before I reanticipated the mosquito conflagration..."

 

...or something that would have made more sense to Jim if he were a mechanical genius, and also a Scotsman. Before he had to ask for clarification, though, Scotty stopped himself with, "I think I can do it, Captain," and that was really all he needed to hear.

 

"Away team, assemble in the transporter room," Jim said, with possibly more enthusiasm than impending death by scalping deserved. "Phasers set to stun: we'll give them the benefit of the doubt this time."

 

\--

 

It turned out the distress signal was real, which was such an anomaly Jim actually forgot how he was supposed to handle the survivors until Scotty came over the communicator, his brogue thick enough to be almost indecipherable, a sure sign he'd been arguing with the ship again. "I'm doing an admirable job keeping her in orbit, Captain, if I am saying so myself, but any more lollygagging and the Enterprise might be joining you lot dirtside."

 

That made things simpler.

 

“I think it’s time we evacuate. Scotty, we have eighteen to beam up.”

 

“There are nineteen of us, Captain, unless you intend to remain.”

 

“Nineteen to beam up, Scotty.” Jim considered threatening to leave Spock behind instead, largely for his insinuations that Jim’s sundry mistakes were all owing to a basic inability to do math, rather than the fact that Jim was frequently too busy saving the day to notice things like small children hidden in their mothers’ skirts or the precise location of a decimal in a stardate from a transmission that really shouldn’t have sounded that clear for how old it was. But Spock was generally unwilling to bite when they weren’t in the midst of an intergalactic crisis.

 

“Captain,” Scotty sighed, sounding a bit preoccupied, “I’m a bit preoccupied right now, trying to keep the ship from exploding. You’d best try calling the transporter room.”

 

“Oh,” said Jim, thrown, because he had honestly believed Scotty regularly managed the transporters and engines at the same time, in the middle of ion storms and Klingon ambushes, all while drunk and half asleep. Jim would also admit his expectations of his crew were sometimes unreasonably high. “Well, who’s running the transporters now?”

 

“I think it's Ensign Fodder, sir.”

 

And Jim hoped it was just the brogue muddling the name, or that kid was never – ever – leaving the ship.

 

\---

 

“Say it.”

 

"They were not 'gummy,' Captain, but rather hairless mammalians with a thick layer of pinkish blubber beneath their translucent skins. They also appeared to be omnivorous, though as they were clearly not suffering for want of food, I cannot at this point determine why they began attacking the colonists."

 

"Man-eating gummi bears, Spock." Obviously Spock didn’t understand the reference, because no human would deny that this was _awesome._ “When we dock at the next base I’m taking these holos to Command and demanding the rights to name them.”

 

The blank look on Spock’s face would be called “gleeful” on anyone else, and it definitely meant he was about to burst Jim’s bubble.

 

“In my capacity as chief science officer I have already filed a report with Starfleet command on the creatures we encountered.”

 

“Did you name them Man-Eating Gummi Bears?” Jim asked with little hope, because Spock very rarely supported his ideas like Jim thought a proper first officer should.

 

“No, Captain. I utilized the common name the villagers had already instituted.”

 

“Which is?”

 

“Haribos, Captain.”

 

Jim burst into laughter so suddenly it left him winded. “What?” he exclaimed between gasps. “Are you _shitting_ me?”

 

“I do not joke, Captain,” Spock replied with an admirable grasp of human colloquialisms.

 

Jim pressed a hand to his side and allowed himself to crumple to the floor. He might have sprained something in his excitement. “This, Spock, this right here is why I _do_ this. Oh, God, Spock, this is _amazing._ ”

 

“Captain, I—“

 

“Seriously, how can you not understand this? Commander Buzzkill, that’s what I’ll call you.” Jim tapped his communicator. “Kirk to Uhu--. No, Chek--, do they even have candy in Russia? Kirk to Mc---wait, no, Ensign Fodder! Ensign Fodder to the captain's quarters!”

 

There was a long pause, long enough for Jim to consider that nobody would assign someone with a last name like “Fodder” to his command. It was probably Cotter or Roberts or something else that didn't sound the least likely person to ever be assigned to an away team.

 

“This is McCoy.” That wasn't even close.

 

“Bones, what's going on? Where's Ensign...Fodder?” Jim mumbled the name uncertainly, because he'd already seen Man-Eating Gummi Bears and a distress signal that was _actually signaling distress_ in one day – a self fulfilling prophecy would pretty much be par for the course.

 

“The Ensign is in sickbay, Captain. Dr. McCoy sent you an incident report.” Spock never missed a chance to point out Jim’s procedural shortcomings. Jim pragmatically refrained from pointing out that he usually just added his name on Spock’s reports to Command and considered it a job well done.

 

Jim frowned. “What the hell happened? We just saw him not thirty minutes ago. He can’t have gotten into trouble that quickly.”

 

“Captain.” Spock always waited for acknowledgment before speaking. He was too Vulcan to admit his need for an audience when imparting his knowledge to the less fortunate, and Jim was generally too amused to not play along. “It is my understanding that a single Haribo boarded the ship amidst the colonists’ personal effects.” Spock chose to stare at Jim placidly rather than elaborate, which only seemed to happen when Jim was actually interested in what he was saying. He suspected it was intentional.

 

“And Ensign Fodder?”

 

“Threw himself on the creature, Captain.” 

 

“Did he not have a phaser?” Because there was stupid, and then there was _stupid_ , and Jim considered himself an expert in knowing the difference. “I mean, what century is this? Is this the official procedure we’re teaching these kids for encounters with carnivorous confections?” Jim couldn’t repress a smile at that because spontaneous alliteration was a point of pride for him.

 

“I admit the Ensign's...rationale...eludes me at this time.”

 

Jim tapped his communicator again. “Bones, I'm reassigning Fodder to your staff. He’s a hazard to himself. Get the kid a blue shirt.”

 

“Dammit, Jim, he's a mechanic, not a doctor,” Bones said, but with more exasperation than ire, which Jim took to mean the matter was settled. Jim had long suspected it was the frequent opportunity to sedate him or perform experimental medical procedures on his person that kept Bones so lenient in their arguments. 

 

But he still had to find someone else to join in his amusement. Man-eating gummi bears didn't turn up every day, and it was obviously past time to introduce Spock to the wonders of processed sugar.

 

“Well, Spock,” Jim said, with a broad hand gesture carefully designed to make him seem clever and confident while simultaneously drawing attention from his receding hairline to his artfully manicured nails – it was a complicated gesture – “looks like it’s just us. Let’s see if we can’t coax the replicator into coughing up some real gummi bears.”

 

Spock turned slightly green, which could be a sign of a serious illness or more likely a blush, and Jim immediately scented a gruesomely embarrassing gummi-related incident in Spock's past. If he hadn't been made a starship captain – and, really, who saw that coming? – Jim had been fully prepared to make his living as a digital stalker, and he relished every opportunity to take his carefully honed skills off the shelf.

 

“Captain, I do not believe—“

 

Spock was interrupted by the chirp of Kirk’s communicator, followed by Uhura’s businesslike tones.

 

“Bridge to Captain Kirk.”

 

Jim counted that as proof of Spock’s dark and sugary past, because Uhura would know, and that was the very definition of “saved by the bell.”

 

“Yes, Lieutenant?”

 

“We’ve picked up another distress signal coming from another planet in the same system. Do you want—”

 

Jim was already running for the bridge before she finished her sentence, and reached her terminal in time to cut her off with a shouted “Yes!” partially from his own excitement and also to further his personal goal of shocking Uhura into at least one gray hair before the end of their first mission.

 

Spock would never do anything so undignified as tearing through the halls to reach the bridge for anything less than a double-red alert, but he still managed to materialize on the bridge next to Jim just as Jim reached the communications terminal. Jim grinned somewhat manically as he listened to the transmission.

 

To say he felt like a kid in a candy store would be in extremely poor taste, but nobody had ever accused Jim of being particularly tactful.

 

“Let’s do this,” Jim said, and the crew took it for the order it was. “And if we find a tribe of murderous marshmallow rabbits, I’m naming them.”

 

Spock did something with his eyebrows that Jim interpreted as an almost-smile. “As you say, Captain.”

 

“Mr. Sulu,” Jim said, and _damn_ he loved his job, “punch it.”

   
  
---  
  



End file.
